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blog:x68_launcher_1 [2020/08/22 11:31] – [Design Principles] johnblog:x68_launcher_1 [2021/02/24 15:32] (current) john
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-====== X68000 Game Launcher - Article 1: Design Logical Structure ======+====== X68kLauncher,X68000 Game Launcher - Information Downloads ======
  
-So, you've got a fancy new (old) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X68000|Sharp X68000]], and you've [[https://nfggames.com/X68000/index.php/Games/|somehow]] managed to get loads of games for it.+{{:blog:x68000_launcher_2.png?500|}} 
  
-But you can't remember what all of those games arewhere they are on your hard-drive, SD card or CF card, or what those truncated directory names like 'Nova', 'Plin' or 'Buster' actually refer to.+My //X68kLauncher// application is written in Cusing the the [[blog:x68_devtools|GCC development tools as detailed on my site]].
  
-AlsoI'm old now and I can't be bothered to navigate around a DOS filesystem any more, and the common 'browser' used on the X68000 is, well, mind numbingly boring... +//What is it, and what does it do?//
  
-{{:blog:lhes_01.png?400|}}+//X68kLauncher// is graphical game browser and launcher for the late-80's range of X68000 personal computers from Sharp.
  
-... and it's not even decent file explorer... it's for extracting archives!+It runs on the Sharp X68000 hardware itself, either emulated or real physical system; it is __not__ Window/Mac/Linux application like [launchbox](https://www.launchbox-app.com/) or [RetroArch](https://github.com/libretro/RetroArch).
  
-Well in this series of articles I'm going to document my process for writing graphical game browser and launcher for the X68000 itselfNot a cop-out by doing something similar for WindowsMac or LinuxThis is going to be a real piece of executable code that can run on the Sharp hardware, or inside an X68000 emulator.+   * It creates browseable list of all the game directories on your drive(s) 
 +   * It can load and display additional metadata per game (i.e developergenre, release date etc) 
 +   * It can load and display screenshots or artwork per game (i.e box art, screenshots, etc) 
 +   * It can export an audit file of all the found games 
 +   * It can launch any game for which a start file is either found (e.g. start.bat), or which has been defined in metadata (e.g. run.com, go.exe, etc)
  
-===== Design Principles =====+A demo of a (early) version of the application can be found on my Youtube channel:
  
-There are some design principles for this application:+{{youtube>3cuFtyWimM8?large}}
  
-   * **Must be able to be installed and run with minimal technical knowledge** +You can find versions of the X68kLauncher application ready to download on this pageas well as packaged up versions of games and their metadata ready to go.
-     * I'm a programmer, but many people who use these old systems are not; they just want to play games on them. It should be possible to just unzip this application into a directory, edit a simple text file, and get it running. No developer or technical skills needed.+
  
-   * **Must run on the base X68000 configuration with hard drive** +As a reminderyou'll need the following:
-     * There are many different X68000 modelsbut the application should be able to run on all of them, without requiring any special hardware (e.g. FPU, or large memory expansions). A minimally expanded 2MB system (just the on-board 1MB and a 1MB upgrade card) is what we'll aim for. No FPU, no 68030.+
  
-   **Build a list of games from a set of directories on (one or more) hard drive(s)** +   A Sharp X68000 (or emulator, such as **xm6g**) 
-     The common pre-installed hard drive image that is distributed amongst the community is a single 900MB image, but we need to cater for users with multiple drives and partitions, or games installed in locations other than the defaults in that image. Wherever the games are installed on the system, it should be possible to include them by simply listing where their parent directory is; e.g. A:\Games, or C:\Stuff\RPG_Games.+   hard drive 
 +   * Minimum of 2MB of memory
  
-   * **Display a nice user interface to scroll through the games, or filter by category (Action, Sports, RPG, Strategy, etc)** +All the files necessary to run the application are included in the application zip file.
-     * The big one. This is what will set the application apart from any of the existing launchers, file browsers or similar tools. Let's have something that looks nice and gives us extra information on a game or filter down from possibly hundreds of installed games to those we're interested in; just Strategy games, for example.+
  
-   * Launch any selected game +===== Application Binaries ===== 
-   * //(Optionally)// Inject extra metadata and artwork into those games + 
-   * //(Optionally)// Allow control by keyboardjoystick or mouse +Pre-compiled versions of the X68kLauncher application are listed here. 
-   * //(Optionally)// Output an audit file of all games+ 
 +^ Date           ^ Notes                                ^ Download Links                      ^ 
 +|                |                                      |                                     | 
 + 
 +===== Application Source Code ===== 
 + 
 +Source code for the X68kLauncher application can always be found at Github: 
 + 
 +   https://github.com/megatron-uk/x68klauncher 
 + 
 +===== Game Metadata ===== 
 + 
 +These packages include a pre-written __launch.dat__ metadata file, screenshots, box artwork and custom start files (in most cases following the Sharp X68000 convention of being named __!start.bat__). In cases where a game has a configuration tool to set music/sound optionsthis is set as the alt_start executable. 
 + 
 +The packages should unzip directly to a directory such as __A:\Games__ on your X68000 hard drive and //be ready to go//. //You don't need to find anything else//. 
 + 
 +^ Info ^ Name                    ^ Developer      ^ Metadata ^ Screenshots ^ Box Artwork ^ Audio ^ Notes                 ^ 
 +|      |                                        |          |                                                     |
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  • by john